Endoscopic surgery, also known as minimally invasive surgery, uses an endoscope delivered through a small body incision or a natural body orifice to collect images of the surgical site. Conventional endoscopes usually include two fiber optic lines for image collection—a “light fiber” which carries light into the body cavity, and an “image fiber” which carries the image of the body cavity back to the physician's viewing lens. Such endoscopes can further include a separate axial port or working channel for administration of drugs, suction, and irrigation. This working channel may also be used to introduce small surgical instruments or end-effectors, such as forceps, scissors, brushes, etc. for tissue excision, sampling, or other diagnostic and surgical work. The goal of endoscopic surgery is to reduce tissue trauma and the body's response to the injury of traditional (or open) surgery. Examples of endoscopic surgery include laparoscopic cholecystectomies (gall bladder removal) and appendectomies; arthroscopic surgery of the interior of bone joints; endoscopic rhinosinusitis; colonoscopic excisions, endoscopic discectomy, etc. In addition, endoscopic tools may be used for visualization and manipulation of architectural scale models, complex technical systems, improvised explosive devices, and other non-medical applications.
The growing capabilities of endoscopic tools have allowed physicians to perform an increasing variety of surgeries and diagnostic procedures through small body openings. Further refinement of the endoscopic devices may enable the physicians to access the target sites through even less invasive routes, and thereby cause less post-operative pain, less scar tissue formation, and shorten the recovery time. Improvement in the design and functionality of the minimally invasive tools would make endoscopic procedures feasible for body regions not accessible with conventional endoscopic tools, and would contribute significantly towards the advancement of translumenal endoscopic surgeries via natural orifices.